Never had a clinker

I've never directly associated them with a species of wood, probably because I wasn't paying attention, but that makes sense.

 

Funny enough but the word 'clinker' (or 'klinker') is Dutch in origin. I know they did not invent burning coal so they must have been the first people who came along and bothered to give those things a name....

From Wikipedia:
"From Dutch klinkaerd, later klinker, from klinken (“to ring, resound”).

Noun
clinker (plural clinkers)

1. A very hard brick used for paving customarily made in the Netherlands. [from 17th c.]
2. A mass of bricks fused together by intense heat. [from 17th c.]
3. Slag or ash produced by intense heat in a furnace, kiln or boiler that forms a hard residue upon cooling. [from 18th c.]
4. Hardened volcanic lava. [from 19th c.]  [quotations ▼]
5. A scum of oxide of iron formed in forging. [from 19th c.]

And sure enough, coal clinkers <could> be used for paving 'cause merely driving a car over them would not break them down.

Brian

 

Coal clinkers were used to make cinder block. Don't see them much today because they have been replaced by concrete, or cement block.

I remember the coal furnace in grade school. They took us on a tour of the janitors room, which housed the furnace. The furnace was huge, and when the doors were opened it was like a blast furnace. There would be large garbage cans outside for the sanitation department to pick up of ash and clinkers. Must have weighed at least a couple hundred pounds each. For some reason, that image is emblazoned in my memory.